NEWSLETTER FASHION & SUSTAINABILITY NO. 8 | 14.5.2012

A couple of days ago all eyes turned to Copenhagen, as the Fashion Summit converted the Danish Capital into the hub of the eco-fashion-world. Now the dust has settled, we give our readers a brief overview about the main issues of the conference. To connect the dots and see what the buzz is all about we asked the Berlin based author Maik Günther for an exclusive article about the Nordic Initiative, Clean, and Ethical (NICE). You’ll find his controversial insider-view below and on our blog.

The London Olympics forshadow on the most diverse areas. Sad but true it comes as no revelation, that sportswear brands entering the public limelight belie their high promises regarding business ethics, sustainability and fair labour. So in the upcoming months each of us might not only talk about records in football stadiums and on Olympic grounds, but as well put the business models and their worldwide effects that sponser these events and keep the games going in mind of his environment. (Nevertheless we’re looking forward to celebrate all the sportive successes this summer might bring.)

P. Sainath accused the Times of India of arbitrarily downplaying the negative effects of BT cotton. P. Sainath writes for The Hindu and he is an expert for rural development.

Unsurprisingly Springer-paper „Die Welt“ and liberal weekly „Der Spiegel“ took up different positions on the personnel policy of German discounter Aldi. We show you both of their standpoints in our Brands section.

Last but not least: A short & brilliant aricle on how ancient Greek philosophers could postively influence our modern business life by Jules Evans.

… Polman names a few other companies who are moving in that same direction, and suggests their numbers are growing. … “Why,” he asks, “would you invest in a company which is out of synch with the needs of society, that does not take its social compliance in its supply chain seriously, that does not think about the costs of externalities, or of its negative impacts on society?” Sadly, the answer is simple and obvious: to make a quick buck. … The world – business leaders, politicians, academics, and even the people in the street – have come to believe that it is the legal duty of those who run businesses to maximise the wealth of shareholders, and to hell with everything else.

2. WORKING CONDITIONS

Sri Lanka Times, Thursday, 12 April 2012 21:43

Whilst Sri Lanka’s relatively easy integration into the global political economy’s ‘ethical turn’ should be acknowledged, it is also important to register that its record continues to be patchy – particularly in the realm of a living wage and in thwarting workers’ freedom to associate and collectively bargain, a study on Sri Lanka’s apparel sector says.

… Although management interviews placed great value on welfare councils as giving workers the chance to voice concerns about their work, the field diaries of this research has suggested skepticism at the effectiveness of Workers Councils. “The ability of the workers councils to offer a space for democratic representation of workers was brought to the fore, with the view that management was not taking their complaints seriously. Thus its potential to change working conditions was deemed as relatively limited.” …

3. COTTON and other fibres

The Hindu, P. Sainath, 10.5.2012

Three and a half years ago, at a time when the controversy over the use of genetically modified seeds was raging across India, a newspaper story painted a heartening picture of the technology’s success. “There are no suicides here and people are prospering on agriculture. The switchover from the conventional cotton to Bollgard or Bt Cotton here has led to a social and economic transformation in the villages [of Bhambraja and Antargaon] in the past three-four years.” (Times of India, October 31, 2008). So heartening was this account that nine months ago, the same story was run again in the same newspaper, word for word. (Times of India, August 28, 2011). Never mind that the villagers themselves had a different story to tell.

“There have been 14 suicides in our village,” a crowd of agitated farmers in Bhambraja told shocked members of the Parliamentary Standing Committee on Agriculture in March this year. “Most of them after Bt came here.” The Hindu was able to verify nine that had occurred between 2003 and 2009. Activist groups count five more since then.

Reaping gold through Bt Cotton, Snehlata Shrivastav, TNN Aug 28, 2011

The Times of India response, 10.5.2012: ‘This was not paid news but editorial coverage’

4. TRANSPARENCY

CSR Wire, 4.5.2012

The demand for more transparency is clear. But are rankings helping or offering yet another marketplace for greenwashing?

… Do Consumers Care for Transparency? One survey of consumer attitudes toward corporate citizenship – 25,000 people in 26 countries – found that more consumers form their impression of a company on the basis of its corporate citizenship practices than they do on brand reputation or financial factors. Moreover, a majority said their view of a company was influenced by factors including labor practices, business ethics, responsibility to society, and the company’s environmental impact. …

… Connecting Consumers with the Long Term View. Rather than focusing on moving the sales needle as a result of publicizing CSR, it may be more important to consider the intangible benefit earned over time – building public trust in the company’s efforts to do the right thing. As Clare Melford, CEO of the International Business Leaders Forum, wrote recently in The Guardian, companies must become more transparent and accountable when it comes to ethics and corporate policies to rebuild trust.

The Guardian, Joseph Banga, Bishop from the Democratic Republic of the Congo, 30.4.2012

New EU legislation introducing mandatory transparency for multinational companies could do a lot to help billions living in poverty in resource-rich countries. It could contribute to turning their natural resource wealth from a curse to a blessing if approved in its current form, but it would fail to make a difference if it is watered down.

5. STANDARDS & CERTIFICATES

Oecotextiles Blog, 1.5.2012

Textile Exchange, which administers the new Global Recycle Standard, has introduced what it says is a “minor but important” change in GRS version 2.1, according to the April/May 2012 issue of Ecotextile News. (If you’re wondering what the Global Recycle Standard is all about, please see our blog post on the subject: click here .)

The new change removes the allowance for the use of pre-industrial waste. The Version 2.1 will only recognize pre-consumer and post-consumer waste.

7. REGIONS

INIDIA

Times of India, 1.5.2012

MADURAI: Over 50,000 children from Madurai, Theni and Dindigul continue to be sent to the northern states to work in factories run by local merchants in violation of the Right To Education (RTE) Act and need to be identified and brought back, members of the Campaign Against Child Labour (CACL), Tamil Nadu and Puducherry said at the state-level conference on child labour held in Madurai on Monday.

GlobalPost, 2.5.2012

His death sent a chill through the ranks of labor rights advocates who operate here in Ashulia, including Babul Akhter of the Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity, who suspects Bangladeshi government security forces of killing Islam, who had been arrested and tortured before in connection with his work.

“No one wants to join unions out of fear,” said Khorshed Alam, the executive director for Alternative Movements for Resources and Freedom, a labor rights organization.. “The local owners, the brands, the government, their positions are all the same on this. They know that if the workers get organized, they will have to start listening to them.”

The garment manufacturing sector wields enormous influence here. Last year, the industry accounted for almost 80 percent of the country’s exports according to data from the Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exports Association (BGMEA).

Finding that competing countries like China, India, and Vietnam are now too expensive, foreign brands are flocking to Dhaka to take advantage of the lowest wages in the world — less than half of the new minimum wage expected to be implemented in Cambodia, its closest competitor in terms of cheap labor. The typical Chinese wage minimum wage is now four to five times that of Bangladesh.

CAMBODIA

30 April 2012: For years, trade unions and the workers they represent in the garment sector have been subject to numerous serious violations of their rights. Excessive hours of work and poor working conditions have led to several episodes of mass fainting. Collective bargaining agreements are being breached, and employers are refusing to negotiate with certain independent unions.

Workers are fired for anti-union motives and are not reinstated, despite binding arbitration awards in their favour. The industry has shifted to using short, fixed duration contracts in an effort to create employment instability and undermine the exercise of fundamental rights. This year, workers have also been the victims of violence, including a shooting outside of a garment factory earlier this year; the perpetrator has been charged on a minor offense yet still remains free.

As May Day approaches, Cambodian unions are mobilising to demand respect on the job. The International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC) fully supports Cambodian trade unions in their efforts to overcome these many challenges.

At the same time, the ITUC is appalled to learn that GMAC (Garment Manufacturers’ Association in Cambodia), the members of whom are responsible for many of the labour violations in the garment industry, has lashed out at the workers rather than engaging in good faith dialogue.

Sharan Burrow, the ITUC General Secretary, reacted, stating “It is simply unacceptable that employers are calling on the authorities to ‘crack down’ on legitimate strikes and worse that they are publicly demonising independent unions who have had the courage to stand up for their members and demand respect on the job.” The ITUC has launched an urgent call for mature industrial relations in Cambodia, as genuine dialogue with the workers is the only way forward. Decent work and social dialogue are the pillars for sustainable development and social peace.

8. FAIRS, CONFERENCES

Institutes for Human Rights and Business, 08.5.2012

This week European officials, businesses and other stakeholders are meeting in Copenhagen for a conference entitled “Business and Human Rights – Principles to Practice” under the auspices of the Danish Government … Designed to initiate national implementation plans in all 27 EU countries for the UN Guiding Principles, the conference is being co-facilitated by the Institute for Business and Human Rights.

One of the keynote speeches [5 pages] was delivered by Richard Howitt MEP … argues that although the Guiding Principles have transformed the debate on corporate responsibility in Brussels, the European Union is suffering from its own failure of policy coherence in major areas where it could and should be promoting Business and Human Rights. He seeks to help those who argue faster progress should be made, by warning of the dangers to European business and to the EU economy as a whole, if the European Union fails to implement the Guiding Principles.

… The project leaders repeatedly emphasised that the main objective of “educating” consumers is to empower them to make the right choices. This does not only relate to buying decisions, but consumer behaviour. The Fair Wear Foundation has managed to explain these difficult issues in a well thought through video.

Ecotextile News, 4.5.2012

“There will soon be around 3 billion middle-class people on the planet consuming more and more commodities such as clothing,” said Hedegaard. “The way we both create and consume these commodities will soon come into the wider picture,” she said, “so the paradigm of clean and green fashion now needs to move from the margins into the mainstream.”

The NICE document sets out a series of potential options to encourage European governments to back the sustainable fashion agenda. These options include the integration of sustainable fashion into the educational curriculum from the primary to tertiary level, the consolidation of the current plethora of eco-labels, new guidelines to penalise greenwashing; new efforts to support the take-back, upcycle and recycle of garments and fabrics, the exploration of economic incentives for consumers to recycle or tax breaks for sustainable retail practise.

The document also urges the European Commission to revisit policy on harmful substances and take a more in-depth look at new technologies such as nanotechnology and GMO’s used in textiles and clothing.

India Times, Economic Times, 8.5.2012

Growing pressure from developed countries, especially the EU and the US, to meet global standards on labour has pushed Indian apparel manufacturers to take legal compliance matters in their own hands to change the image problem plaguing the country.

… The drive is part of the bigger initiative launched by AEPC called DISHA, that aims to spread awareness regarding the importance of social compliance amongst textile exporters and define a common code with global endorsement. …

EU Kommission: Reference: MEMO/11/734 Date: 25/10/2011

The European Commission has proposed amendments to the existing Directive on transparency requirements for listed companies and to the Directives on accounting rules for annual accounts and consolidated accounts, inter alia to introduce country by country reporting, as part of a Responsible Business Initiative package of measures (see IP/11/1238).

Earlier versions of Nike’s sustainability reports read like audit statements. That’s because they were: data charts about underage workers employed, safety rules violated, and so forth. All peppered with some pretty pictures of smiling children, of course. So what’s changed?

… First, Nike feels it’s done more or less all it can to ensure supply chain compliance. Its record will never be perfect. Ethical issues will continue to crop up, especially among sub-suppliers. But most of the retailer’s major suppliers are on board, if only because of Nike’s big-stick approach. (It still employs 70 full-time compliance officers, plus a host of third-party auditors.) … Which brings us to the second point: when it comes to saving the planet, compliance doesn’t cut it. “We can’t just be less bad”, says Hannah Jones, vice president of sustainable business and innovation at Nike. The big thing that’s changed at Nike is therefore the focus of its ambition. It is “upping its game”, to use the company’s own sporting parlance. In cricket terminology, its new “game plan” for sustainability is the difference between a forward defence and a full-on hoick out of the ground. “There’s never been such an urgency for scale as we see today … CR [corporate responsibility] programmes that incrementally chip away at things aren’t going to be enough”, explains Jones.

Ecotextiles, 27.4.2012

PPR Group … has strengthened its long-term commitment to sustainability with the introduction of environmental and social five-year targets across its luxury and sports and lifestyle brands and the acquisition of a stake in a carbon offsetting company.

The 2016 targets are expected to function together with PPR’s existing Environmental Profit & Loss Account (E P&L) program to help identify new opportunities across the supply chain. The aim is also to enhance the sustainability of its products and to ultimately implement efficient and innovative initiatives to reduce the environmental impacts from the sourcing of raw materials, processing, manufacturing, and distribution of the Group’s products. … Key areas of focus during this period will be the reduction of CO2, waste and water; sourcing of raw materials; hazardous chemicals and materials; paper and packaging; and the supply chain.

Sustainable Brands, 2.5.2012

Walmart released its latest CSR report highlighting progress on goals for reducing waste, increasing locally grown produce, and developing sustainability rankings for its products. The report will likely stir the ongoing debate over whether or not the giant retailer, which has a core business model of providing the lowest cost products to the largest possible number of people, can ever be truly sustainable.

“There are multiple suppliers and multiple products within a product category,” Thomas explains. “This allows us to understand the sustainability hotspots within those categories and rank the suppliers based on information they provide us on their practices around those hotspots.” … During the Milestone meeting, several members of Walmart’s merchandizing organization explained the critical role the company’s buyers will play in leveraging the scorecards, because they are the ones who “own the relationship” with suppliers and ultimately pick the products that will be sold in stores around the world.

11. NGO CAMPAIGNS & PROJECTS

Playfair 2012 Campaign

The Fair Games? report investigated working conditions in 10 sportswear factories in China, Sri Lanka and the Philippines where they produced sportswear that will be bought by consumers and used by athletes and volunteers at the London 2012 Olympic Games.

Poverty wages were found across the board. In Sri Lanka, some workers have to survive on around £1.78 a day, little above the UN’s official poverty line, and only 25% of the amount needed for a living wage, enabling workers to live in dignity. In the Philippines, 50% of workers were forced to pawn their ATM cards to loan sharks for pay day loans to get them through the month.

Workers had legal benefits systematically denied to them by repeated use of short term contracts. Employers used these to avoid paying social insurance including pensions, sick leave and maternity benefits.

Workers were forced to perform overtime under threat of losing their jobs.

In all 10 factories there was no recognised union or credible workers’ representatives, meaning workers had no voice on pay and conditions. In China workers were threatened with job losses for distributing leaflets that could ‘hamper employer-employee relationships; and in the Philippines all workers interviewed said that they were scared to join a union as they would lose their jobs.

Living conditions showed the poverty levels experienced by workers. Chinese workers shared cramped and overcrowded rooms with hot water only available after 23:00, when their shift finished.

This catalogue of human rights abuses in both Olympic supply chains and the supply chains of multinational companies must be addressed by the Olympic movement and by sportswear brands and retailers.

ITUC, 7.5.2012

Workers making Olympic sportswear for London 2012 for top brands and high street names including adidas and Next are being paid poverty wages, forced to work excessive overtime and threatened with instant dismissal if they complain about working conditions, according to a new report from the Play Fair 2012 campaign.

The Atlantic, Kathy Marks, 29.4.2012

Mirna works up to 60 hours a week in an Indonesian factory, stitching tracksuits and T-shirts for adidas, the official sportswear partner of the London Olympics. While the German company expects to make tens of millions of euros from this summer’s Games, Mirna earns just 8,125 rupiah (Dh3.28) an hour, and has had to send her son away to be looked after by grandparents.

Institute for Global Labour and Human Rights

For the last several months, we have travelled back and forth to Bangladesh to confront some of Europe’s and Australia’s most prominent retailers. They have excellent codes of conduct, which are also completely useless. In fact, the high end retailers handed over their production, lock, stock and barrel, to the secretive South Ocean Group-(they do not even have a website)-which is one of the world’s largest knitwear manufacturers. South Ocean in turn, sent production to the Rosita and Megatex factories, located in the North Bengal region of Bangladesh.

Project Description: “RAGS: Improving Social Standards in the Indian Ready-Made Garment Sector” is a program of SAI to improve working conditions of workers by reducing gender discrimination and improving factory level processes of engagement with homeworkers in supply chain. The program is supported by UKAID from the Department for International Development (DFID). Activities will focus on classroom and onsite trainings of suppliers and subcontractors on gender discrimination issues and engagement with homeworkers.

The project includes the participation from global retailers such as Gap Inc., Timberland and PGC-Switcher— who will assist SAI to select and engage with group of suppliers based in India. RAGS also works in collaboration in SAI’s PPP with BSCI and GIZ, “Scaling Up Indian Responsible Business Initiatives.”

Posted on 26/04/2012

European and US garment brands and retailers have failed in their attempts to structurally improve labour conditions at their suppliers in Tamil Nadu, South India. Despite corporate promises and a range of well-meaning initiatives, workers, mostly very young women, continue to suffer exploitative working conditions. Up until today, thousands of women in the garment and textile industry in Tamil Nadu work under recruitment and employment schemes that amount to bonded labour. These are the findings by the Centre for Research on Multinational Corporations (SOMO) and the India Committee of the Netherlands (ICN) – partner in the Stop Child Labour campaign – presented in the report

Kanchana N. Ruwanpura, Univ. of Southampton (UK), 19.4.2012

This report provides initial findings from a three year study, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council, on evolving labour practice responses to ethical trading initiatives at sites of production which focuses on the Sri Lankan apparel sector (Grant number: RES-061-25-0181). The report focuses on what the Sri Lankan apparel sector’s evolution into value-added apparel production implies for labour conditions and practices at production sites. It is also interested in exploring what local institutional factors enables Sri Lanka to position itself as a supplier engaged in ethical production and the extent to which the ‘garments without guilt’ initiative rests upon legitimate adherence to global ethical code regimes. Issues of paramount importance as the world economy go through a downturn. This report is intended as a sole key point summary primarily targeting the non-academic community as its readership; those interested in detailed findings of the project should contact Dr. Kanchana N. Ruwanpura (k.n.ruwanpura@soton.ac.uk)

Global Post (Website)

It’s been called a “race to the bottom.” The hyper-accelerated movement of capital, jobs and resources from the world’s international corporations — manufacturing, agriculture, service — to the lowest bidder. GlobalPost explores the human cost of such a race in an era of diminished expectations, broken promises and sleight of hand between governments, emp loyers, unions and their workers.

This GlobalPost ‘Special Report,’ titled “Worked Over: The Global Decline of Labor Rights,” explores the way the forces of free-market capitalism have rapidly eroded hard-won protections negotiated between governments, labor unions and activists in countries with developed economies, like Spain, the United States and Canada.